Day 19: Live below the poverty line – £1 a day

• Breakfast: porridge + water
  
• Lunch: frozen toast from week 1 with “Brussels pate” + 3 remaining fish fingers
• Dinner: fresh egg noodles (10p) + value sweet and sour (30p) + broccoli (10p)
• ‘Treat’: reduced doughnuts x 2 

Freeganism is a lifestyle philosophy focused on adopting alternative methods to limit dependence on consumerism. Freegans typically scavenge for discarded items, barter or create their own goods. Last week I visited Skipchen in Bristol to learn more about urban foraging and skip diving, this weekend I have decided to take a closer look at wild foraging…

It’s the wrong time of year for most things really but my friend Jane has read about some edible berries located in Whitefield Moor in the New Forest that can be enjoyed in winter. They look delicious online so we don our boots and head for the hills on a berry mission…

We arrive at the moor and I’m armed with my knife and fork in case hunger strikes or we have to defend our bounty from New Forest bandits.

The moor is pretty sparse so we quickly realise we need directions, luckily it’s not long before we spy some of the locals… 

 I seek out the fattest one and after some initial language barriers, I am able able to overcome the dialect issue by pointing earnestly to the picture of the berries, talking loudly and over enunciating each word.

Turns out we need to go east into the thickets…

High and low… Nooks and crannies… and still no sign of these blimming berries…

I stumble upon a poking device in the form of a stick and take my search further in land…

After a wee poke about under a log, I find a grub worm and a red berry (holly we think) but it’s no banquet…

It’s an unsuccessful start so we decide to take stock in a make shift teepee. 

But whilst our guards are down we are ambushed by a passing wolf pack…

Feeling like Mowgli, I sit around for a while, taking in the fresh air and exchanging pleasantries with Wolfie about the weather. I make one faux pas by enquiring if little red riding hood is in good health and things turn a little sour…

There’s a struggle between Wolfie and I over the stick, I quickly realise it’s futile to resist further so I abandon the poking device and flee the teepee, stickless and berryless.

Sanctuary is back at the ranch. Empty handed from our frankly fruitless quest we decide it’s probably wiser to leave these things to the experts. Foraging trips if done correctly and legally under the guide of someone who knows what they’re doing can be bountiful and nutritious. This wasn’t one of those….

I redeem matters with a  touch of urban foraging in the whoopsie aisle for the Sunday feast I’ve got planned tomorrow (watch this space) and pick up some fresh noodles and sweet and sour for a little Saturday night chinese.

 If you want to watch my homemade guide on ‘How not to find food in the forest’, please do so here http://youtu.be/TMGbH0HFE7g

Or below.

 

(Bait used was Salmon and Garfunkel)